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Assuming the primacy of established patterns of bargaining over the formal ones, in transitional, unstable settings—well-known to the power-sharing systems—informal institutions can emerge as the preponderant rules of interaction. Yet, there is significant negligence in the power-sharing literature that should have been devoted to the informalities embedded in the political systems of divided societies. Filling in this gap, the paper analyses the creation, role and meaning of informal institutions in the consociational model. Using the case study of the Brčko District in Bosnia and Herzegovina and framework offered by Helmke and Levitsky ('Informal institutions and comparative politics: A research agenda', Perspectives on Politics, 4, 724–740, 2004), it claims that the presence of informal-corporate institutions is crucial for the functioning of its consociational system and necessary to accommodate the existing formal-liberal ones. The detailed case study analysis brings conclusions that could extend the current understanding of the power-sharing model and tackle the debate about liberal consociationalism being the preferred version of power sharing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In consociational theory, veto rights are a primary means by which ethnic groups defend their vital interests. Yet, the uses and effects of vetoes are variable. Sometimes, the veto is protective, used as a policy of last resort to facilitate inter-group cooperation and community protection. At other times, the veto is a blocking mechanism, used against minority interests or to immobilise the legislative agenda. What accounts for this variation in veto outcomes? In this article, we set out a new framework for assessing veto variability and apply the framework to three consociations – Northern Ireland, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and North Macedonia. We argue that whether a veto trajectory is blocking or protective is contingent on the interplay between three dynamics: formal institutional rules; informal forms of dispute resolution, and; the wider political environment in which these formal and informal rules intersect. Our findings aim to refine extant consociational theory, which has largely under-conceptualised these variations in veto trajectories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Local political elites in Bosnia and Herzegovina have been unable not only to use existing political institutions but also to reform them. It triggered two informal attempts to create an agreement on the institutional reform undertaken in the years 2008–2009. The paper focuses on comparison of both processes, following the main assumption that decision-making processes in multi-ethnic environment depends not on inter-ethnic, but intra-ethnic competition. This argument was supported by Georg Tsebelis’ nested game theory, which explains the phenomenon by introducing the concept of two arenas and multiple games while one variable, monopoly of intra-ethnic representation, is considered crucial to limit the outbidding chain. Consequently, it was concluded that the Prud negotiations with exactly one actor from each group were supposed to be more successful than the much more diverse Butmir talks. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]